Stricken: Living Life on the AY Spectrum
by R.J. Ames
Summary: This story follows Neaira (the commando-turned-Banshee) on her life journey from childhood through to her conversion at the hands of the Reapers. Neaira and her family deal with love and loss as they attempt to lead normal lives in the face of a devastating diagnosis. Aeian T'Goni (PTSD Commando)/Neaira; Tashya Porae/Weshra (asari widow)
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer**

I do not own any of the characters or storylines from the Mass Effect Universe.

**Author's Note**

I don't know why I chose such fringe characters for my first posted story. Even though there might not be much interest in these characters, Aeian's recounting of the events on Tiptree in particular really struck with me, and I felt like her background story just had to be told. It quickly turned into a story more about her friend Neaira, however, because the suggestion that she might be an Ardat-Yakshi living a sort of normal life, made her too compelling to pass up.

Then I just thought 'Hey, wouldn't it be ultra tragic if the asari widow Shepard meets on the Citadel also turned out to be the mother of the cammando who was turned into a Banshee?' And I just went with it. I hope that by the end of this story (if you bear with me that long), this relationship seems believable.

This story kind of meanders a bit, but since we all know the ending, I didn't see the need to rush there ;)

•**¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•**

PART I

**Prologue**

Neaira could no longer tell where her own body ended and the darkness began. It suddenly felt as though she had never known anything except darkness—a cold, angry darkness that creeps along inside you, twisting and contorting whatever it comes across along the way as it sees fit.

Neaira could feel herself being overtaken. The feeling came in brief, panic-stricken flashes that seemed all too vivid and clear. But the flashes were welcome. She tried desperately to hold on to them, not knowing what might be left within herself once they were gone.

She couldn't fight back. She felt, even though she couldn't quite remember, that she had tried to fight: thrashing and flailing her body against the silent intruder. That was when she had had energy for such an outburst, and when it had seemed, wrongly, as though nothing but an unrestrained eruption of heated emotions could possibly halt the inexorable march of the darkness within.

But now she lay immobile, partly paralyzed by fear, but there also seemed to be some sort of external source holding her in place when all she wanted to do was move, run, escape.

Then, suddenly, she felt herself slipping, and she tried to hold on—to herself, to her own mind—but she sensed somehow, with a feeling of straining, inward pressure, that she just couldn't. She opened her mouth, which suddenly seemed gaping, cavernous, and out came not a scream, but an otherworldly screech that came from deep inside her own body. And as that screech rang in her mind, the only sensation left to Neaira was one of falling.

•**¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•**

**Chapter 1**

Neaira woke with a start. She could feel beads of sweat forming on her brow as she clenched the bedspread with her little fists. She sat up, listening, fear settling in. It was the irrational fear that takes hold of the young, the fear that casts sudden suspicion not only upon the most mundane of objects but also, worse, upon all that is left unseen in the dark. The house was silent.

In that moment, Neaira made a decision. She tore away the bedspread, and jumped out of bed, pulled open the door to her bedroom and began her sprint across the living room to the staircase that led to her parents' room. Her way was lit by the gentle blue of her uncontrolled biotic flare. She ran up the stairs, not daring to look back, and with one smooth motion she opened the door to her parents' room, and took a running leap onto the bed. She landed on her knees at the foot of the bed, stopping her forward momentum with her hands.

Neaira stared at her mother, allowing her biotics to cool down, already feeling slightly safer. Her mother woke and raised her head to look at her daughter, only slightly surprised by the little commotion at the bottom of her bed.

Her mother was alone, which was not so uncommon for the bondmate of a commando, and although Neaira loved her father dearly, she was glad that she was not here tonight, as it meant that her mother was more likely to allow her to stay.

"I had a bad dream," Neaira said.

"You're getting too old for this," her mother replied, but even as those words were escaping her mouth, she was pulling back the covers beside her, letting Neaira in.

Neaira didn't need more prompting than that; she quickly scrambled up the bed, and slipped under the covers next to her mother. As the two settled in, Neaira pulled the blankets right up past her nose, and began to wiggle her way until she felt the warmth of her mother's front against her own back. Her heart rate had settled, her breathing controlled, and by the time she felt her mother's hand rest gently on her waist, she was drifting slowly off to sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

(a little info-dumpy, sorry)

Tashya opened the holo locket she kept around her neck and looked at the faces of her bondmate and daughter. She smiled to herself, grateful that the frigate Verya was finally finished its four-month rotation patrolling asari space. As the Verya's crew was busy preparing the ship for docking at the Serrice spaceport, Tashya sat in the communal living space with the rest of the ground force team. There was soft chatter and light touches as the commandos circulated amongst each other, all looking forward to the time they will be able to spend at home with their families and loved ones.

Tashya glanced over at the corner of the room where the youngest additions to their team had gathered and were now chatting excitedly. They were, most of them, no older than 90—apprentices from Bóthildir's Guild, Serrice's guild of commandos. Despite some recent political clamour for change, Serrice still stuck to the old ways, in which a system of guilds governed the majority of the city's most important professions. Tashya was never one for politics, but if someone asked, she didn't think that she would mind defending the system as it was. She knew first-hand, anyways, that it produced damn fine commandos, and that was good enough for her.

Tashya kept her eyes on the group and smiled sadly to herself. These relatively short patrols were rarely eventful, but that very morning they had stumbled upon a fairly gruesome slaving ring, and it was the first real fighting most of the apprentices had ever seen. It wasn't the most intense fighting Tashya had been a part of, and she was pleased that the apprentices weren't the worse for wear from it either. But images flashed through her mind of the slaves and the conditions they were forced to live under. Tashya shuddered. Some were children—of her own species, even: girls not even yet maidens, girls not much older than Tashya's own daughter. She could tell that at the time many of the new commandos were shocked by what they saw, and it always made Tashya a little sad when each years' new apprentices got their first glimpse of the horrors that are out there in the galaxy.

The young commandos in the corner no longer seemed bothered by any of that, though. They were still chatting happily and seemed more excited than anything else. It bothered Tashya a little that they weren't a bit more sombre, and she wondered if that showed her age. Not many matrons decided to remain commandos as they got older, and Tashya was beginning to understand why not. She no longer felt the thrill that each new mission once brought, or that post-fight high that the youngest additions to their crew were clearly now experiencing. She wondered, as she did every so often, if she shouldn't just retire. Then she would at least be able to spend more time with her family.

"They sure do grow up fast," said a voice than came from behind her, interrupting her thoughts.

Tashya thought the speaker might be referring to the apprentices in the corner until realised that she still had the little locket open in front of her. She looked behind her shoulder and was relieved to see that it was her good friend Hypatia who was looking down at the holos of her family. Most of the commandos in her unit knew that Tashya was the father of her bondmate's daughter, and although none openly criticized her for it, she knew that many disagreed with her and her bondmate's decision. In fact, she was surprised to have been elected commander of the Verya's ground forces almost three decades ago, shortly after her daughter's birth. The product of two asari parents herself, Tashya was well aware of how deep some prejudices ran in her society and was never sure to what extent others would hold it against her. She knew now that her unit respected her command, but there were still times, it seemed especially when she was missing her family the most, when she worried that they might criticize that aspect of her life behind her back.

But with Hypatia, it was different; Tashya found her open, straight forward, easy to read, and she was the one person with whom she was absolutely comfortable talking about her family.

"Yes, can you believe we meet with Matriarch Nerine today to determine intermediary school placing?" Tashya responded as she tucked the locket away and turned to greet her friend with a kiss on the cheek.

"Oh, you must be so excited!" Hypatia exclaimed as they settled into two of the more comfortable seats in the corner of the room.

Tashya frowned as she thought about the upcoming meeting with her daughter's current headmistress. "More like anxious," she said after a short pause. "She is so young, and to think that the rest of her life will be determined by the end of the day."

Hypatia let out a quick laugh. "Sometimes you can be so dramatic," she said.

Tashya had to smile. She supposed that it did sound a bit dramatic, but everyone in Serrice knew that it was more or less true. Most of the best primary schools in the city were each headed by a matriarch who was tasked, upon each child's graduation, with determining that student's abilities (or lack thereof) and placing her in a school appropriate to them. Tashya couldn't help but worry that if Neaira wasn't placed in a reputable intermediary school now, she wouldn't be chosen to continue on with higher education when the process is more or less repeated decades down the line. It was a frighteningly real possibility; entrance to Serrice's guilds and university was strict, and without the proper backing of their school's matriarch, many young maidens are drawn off-world to join merc bands or start stripping once they graduate. Tashya unconsciously cringed when she pictured Neaira in some skin-tight latex suit dancing on some a somewhere, surrounded by aliens.

"Just you wait til your little one graduates—I know you, you'll be freaking out," Tashya said with a laugh.

"Goddess, if she even makes it that far! Honestly, you'd think I mapped her by accident—she has none of her father's brains and all of my pig-headedness."

"You're horrible!" Tashya laughed.

Hypatia was still very much a maiden, but had had her daughter only a few decades ago. "What can you do when you fall in love with a salarian?" she had said at the time. Tashya found the whole thing odd for a number of reasons, but she supposed they were both a bit odd—Hypatia, the maiden mother, Tashya, the matron commando—and that was probably what endeared her to Hypatia so much, once she thought about it.

She was glad that she could wait out the last anxious hours until the meeting with a friend.

•**¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•¤•**

The final day of school was absolute torture—for the instructors more so than the young pupils. The instructors spent most of their time herding their students and trying hopelessly to keep them out of trouble, while the students themselves virtually bounced off the walls with excitement. The headmistress, Matriarch Nerine, had been holding meetings after school with students and their parents all week, and so many of the students had already moved on to their new schools in their minds, no longer caring for the approval of the poor primary instructors who were still desperate to keep them under control.

Neaira sat quietly at her desk, barely paying attention to her teacher or the other students around her—which was easier said than done because Neaira's class was particularly unruly. It didn't help that her class contained one Kalimica Lemar, a pupil who had, over the past few years, gained quite the reputation as a trouble-maker. Many of Neaira's classmates found Kalimica's antics endlessly entertaining, but Neaira was often not quite sure what to think. Mostly, she was just glad that Kalimica seemed content to save her teasing for a few (ok, a handful) of choice subjects, of which Neaira was thankfully not a part.

Today, since the moment class had started in the morning, Kalimica had been an absolute terror. She had already met with the matriarch the previous evening, so she knew she was to begin advanced biotic training in the new school year, and the whole thing had gone straight to her head.

Despite the slight mayhem the day had thus far brought, Neaira was bored. Her nightmare from the previous night completely forgotten, she was instead focused solely on what was to come later that afternoon: she and her parents were meeting with the matriarch after school. This meant that she was one of the few students who still did not know what school she was heading to in the new year. It also meant that she would have to be stupid to get in trouble today of all days, so she was resigned to the fact that she could not have any fun.

However, it was now after lunch, and Neaira's class—even Kalimica—seemed to have settled down just a bit, and their instructor was finally able to start some semblance of teaching. As she droned on about something or other, Neaira sat at her desk, focusing on a smooth little pebble she had found on her walk to school. As she pushed it around the surface of her desk with small biotic pulses, she felt something hard hit the side of her crest. She turned to see a crumpled piece of garbage on the ground and looked across the aisle to glare at the object's owner—she knew who it was even before looking. Kalimica stared back with a devilish glint in her eye, and she mouthed to Neaira, _watch this!_

Their instructor had let her guard down too quickly, and as she continued her lesson, now reading from the screen at her desk, the small garbage bin in the corner of the room began to move. The bin was full of disposable packaging and leftover food from the class' recent lunch, and perhaps it was heavier than Kalimica had first anticipated, because her biotic lift was unsteady at first. But her confidence was obviously boosted by the fact that she now had the whole class' attention, and she easily pulled the bin through the air to hover above where the instructor sat. A hushed silence fell over the class.

Kalimica was always one to know how to pause for dramatic effect, but her biotics were also not so stable that she could hold the bin there much longer. So without further ado, she promptly tipped it upside down, and dropped the whole thing, bin included, right on top of the poor instructor's head.

The class erupted in noise—gasps, laughter, and jeers—as the instructor stood, lifting the bin off her head as the garbage tumbled onto her shoulders and around her feet. Perhaps she had seen Kalimica's movement at the very last moment, or perhaps it was just a well-informed guess, but the instructor didn't miss a beat before throwing a stasis field right in her direction. But Kalimica had already planned her escape, running down the aisle between the desks, as the stasis field trapped the helpless young pupil who sat behind her instead.

Still trying to free herself from the garbage and bin, the instructor started after Kalimica, heading down the same aisle that ran next to Neaira's desk. Even though Neaira had yet to meet with the matriarch, and so did not want to risk getting caught, the opportunity was just too good to pass up. As she saw the instructor barrelling down the aisle, eyes fixed on the back of her escaping pupil, bringing her hand back for another attempt at a stasis, Neaira did a quick biotic pull on the chair that Kalimica had just left empty, bringing it to stop in the middle of the aisle. By the time the instructor saw the chair in front of her (if she saw it at all), it was too late, and she was sent toppling over it, much to the class' delight.

They could hear Kalimica's laughter echo in the halls as she continued to sprint away from the classroom. Neaira was relieved to see that the instructor hadn't seemed to notice that she was the cause of the unfortunate placement of the chair, not even giving her a reproachful glance. Instead, the instructor scrambled back to her feet and took off after Kalimica, no doubt wanting to stop her before her laughter and taunts alerted the whole school to her own complete inability to contain her class.

Once Kalimica had been reigned in and brought back, the class immediately knew that their fun was over, because guiding her back to her seat with a firm hand on her shoulder was Matriarch Nerine herself. The headmistress strode into the room with a confidence that still managed to radiate a delicate elegance despite the clear authority in her movement. The class' instructor only looked more sheepish in comparison as she followed the pair back into the classroom.

The matriarch had evidently deemed it necessary to directly intervene, as she remained in the classroom for the rest of the day, making Neaira's afternoon quiet and studious.

When the VI by the door to the classroom popped to life and announced the end of the school day, wishing them all a wonderful evening, Matriarch Nerine beckoned Neaira over. Neaira froze as she panicked, thinking that the matriarch must have somehow found out about the chair. Realizing that her classmates had already started filing past her out the door while she was still staring in fear, she tried to gain some composure. She collected her netbook from under her desk, and finally made her way over to the matriarch.

"Neaira. You are the first on my list of meetings this afternoon. Knowing your mother, she is probably already waiting for us at my office. I was wondering if you would be so kind as to go meet her there and inform her that I will be a little late. I have some unexpected business to attend to," the matriarch said as she eyed Kalimica and the instructor, who both looked a little pale. "Give her my apologies and tell her she is welcome to wait in my office. This shouldn't take long."

Neaira felt immediate relief that it seemed like she was getting away with her part in Kalimica's little escape. But Neaira felt a little sorry for her instructor—she knew that Kalimica would be able to handle the matriarch's wrath, but was less sure about her teacher. It almost made her regret the chair. Almost.

Sure enough, when Neaira arrived at the matriarch's office, her mother was waiting in the hall. She bent down to greet Neaira with a kiss. Neaira was still small, even for her age. Her mother kept telling her to be patient, "One of the universe's greatest gifts to our people is time," she had said, "Don't squander that gift by wishing it away." Easy for her to say. Neaira would still pout every time she looked down to her flat chest or she looked in a mirror and saw her still-soft crest with its ends that haven't quite yet formed into hard little peaks.

But today, her impatience was fully consumed by something else entirely. The importance of this meeting with the matriarch wasn't lost on her, and she desperately wanted to know what her future had in store. Waiting all week for this meeting, while she had to watch as so many of her classmates found out their school placings, was pure torture!

Her parents had both been asking where she would like to end up, if she had a choice. Neaira had thought the question horribly mean, because, of course, she didn't have a choice, and so she always told them that she didn't know. But that was a lie. More than anything, Neaira wanted to be placed at a school with advanced biotic training because her dream was to become a commando, like her father. She didn't want to get her hopes up, but she knew her biotics were strong—even better than Kalimica's, although Kalimica was much more willing to show hers off. But she had also excelled in sciences and math, which could mean the matriarch might think her suited for some type of technical institute to be eventually bound to work within the Serrice Council.

Neaira relayed the matriarch's message, and she followed her mother into the office, taking one of the chairs set up in front of the imposing desk. She fiddled a few of the knickknacks set up on the edge of the desk until her mother told her to stop. Luckily, she didn't have to wait much longer for the matriarch to finally arrive.

When she did, she was followed in by Neaira's father, and Neaira had to fight the urge to jump up and give her a huge hug. It felt like _forever _since Neaira had seen her father last. But instead Neaira forced herself to stand patiently—just like her mother had told her to—waiting for the matriarch to sit down. She tried to put on her most solemn face for the occasion.

"Sorry I'm late," Tashya leaned over to Neaira's mother and whispered. "I had to change," she shrugged looking down at her dress. She flashed Neaira a big smile, and Neaira started to feel a little less nervous.

Once they settled in, Matriarch Nerine shuffled a few notes on her desk and then looked up at Neaira. "So, Neaira. How do you think you've been doing this year?" she said.

Neaira wondered how she was supposed to answer such a question. "… good?" she said hopefully.

It earned a slight chuckle from all the adults, anyway, and her father slipped an arm around her shoulders to pull her into a small hug, so Neaira thought her answer must have been ok.

"Well, I can say that many of your instructors agree with your assessment," the matriarch smiled. "With a few exceptions…"

Neaira held her breath, and didn't dare think about what that could mean.

"Which we will go over so that you can start off with your best foot forward at your new school," the matriarch was continuing to say. "But I can tell that you're nervous, so I will start off by saying you have no need to be."

Neaira sat at the edge of her seat, waiting for the matriarch to finally give her the news she's been waiting for. Why do adults take so long to say _everything_? And matriarchs were the worst. Neaira was so busy trying to hurry the matriarch along in her head, that she almost missed it when the headmistress finally said, "And so, we have decided that you will be joining a handful of other promising students at the School of Early Education for the Biotically Advanced."

Neaira's eyes went wide, hoping that she had heard right. She looked up at both her parents sitting next to her, and her mother gave her a reassuring smile. But it was her father's wide grin, which spoke of so much pride, that really made Neaira realise that what she heard was true.

Matriarch Nerine continued to speak to her parents, and Neaira knew that she was supposed to be listening, but she just couldn't. Instead, the only thought that was blissfully ringing through her head was, _I am going to be a commando!_


End file.
